Happy New Year to All Our Loved Ones!!

I just had to put in this picture.

Sister Andersen, Mission President's wife, had this nativity sitting on her coffee table.

A mother of one of the missionaries made it for her.

It is beautiful, the ger on a wagon, I have seen at a muesum.

I did get me a Nativity, it was hand-carved by a man, here in Mongolia.

It even has 2-humped camels!

I just want to put in one comment Pres. Anderson gave at our Mission Conference.

He said that 1% of the Church membership in Mongolia are currently serving as full-time missionaries.

If 1% of the whole church membership was serving as missionaries right now, we would have 4-times the missionaries out!

The people in Mongolia are truly ready for the Gospel! We are blessed to be here!

These are a few of the kids at the Church.

Seminary is over, today is a holiday, they celebrate New Year's Eve more than New Year's Day.

They have a ping-pong table and the kids are always together and playing, several of them have their own paddles.

I think they find alot of friendship and have alot of fun being together.

Some of them walk quite a ways to come to Seminary, at 6:30 in the morning, and in the dark.

Because there was no school they had a Seminary Party.

They served mutton, rice, potato salad and cabbage salad, the salads are pretty good.

The mutton, we're still getting use to, but we are trying!

I brought a cake, they love their sweets.

When you go into a store, 1/3 is alcohol. 1/3 is bread and food. 1/3 is candy!

I'm not kidding there are shelves and shelves of sweets,

and their candy is good, from Russia and Germany.

There are several small, "mom and pop" stores all over, each neighborhood has some, but we have to walk about 15 minutes to get some American food, which is very little.

You can see the apartment building in the background, our is just to Dad's right, they all look the same. And the playground is out our kitchen window.

We are on the 3rd floor, we walk everywhere, about 10 minutes to the Church.

The weather we have described before, this picture says it all!

It was taken on our way home from Seminary this morning.

With the wind and our breath, we look like frosty-people!

Know that we love all of you!

We think of you often and are so grateful for you, we miss you, but we feel of your love and support!

One of the questions the Mission President ask us when he ask us to come to Choibalsan - "Would your family support you?"

We were so grateful to answer,"Yes!"

HAPPY NEW YEAR AND LOVE TO ONE AND ALL!

Baby Talk

Choibalsan, Mongolia

Choibalsan City Sign - "Hot" means City

We got home from Ulaanbaatar, this evening and I wanted to put some of these pictures into the blog, so I left Dad to unpack and do a load of laundry!

Our Mission Conference was really good.

We learned that Choibalsan is the Branch furtherest away from Mission Headquarters.

The Mission Pres. again said how thankful he was for all his "Countryside" couples, there are 5 of us, we are the Grandma's and Grandpa's to these members.

This picture was taken out of our apartment window.
Choibalsan has several ice skating rinks, they love to ice skate.
It was interesting to watch them build this rink, they carried buckets of water and just threw it out where they felt it was needed.
It is very uneaven, but they still skate and play hocky on it, and there is Mongolian music playing, which is nice, since we have no CD player to play anything.


This was parked out side of our apartment.
The best place to shop, and their idea of a mall is called a "Zaah" they have everything from meat to vegatables to used plumbing supplies. There are lots of small booths and vendors, and if you buy too much or something too big, you can hire a horse and cart to take you home!


They have playgrounds all over the city, each apartment complex has a playground.
You can see the kids playing all the time, even in winter.
This Ger and people are especially well taken care of.
It is located at a kindergarten, about 4 blocks from our apartment.
Isn't it so cute?

Merry Christmas from Mongolia!

We had a Missionary Conference in Ulaanbaatar at the Mission Office.

Some of the Elders dressed in Traditional Mongolian Deel's.

They suggested every one dress up, we will next year.

It has been fun to be in the city, to see friends from the MTC and meet some of the couples from the other parts of the country. We will leave to fly back to Choibalsan Monday afternoon.

This is some of the sisters with their traditional Mongolian clothing.

They are a beautiful people and so quiet and friendly.

They also love having their pictures taken.

President Andersen made an interesting comment about the Mongolian missionary work.

1% of the Mongolian church membership are missionaries.

If 1% of the whole church membership were missionaries, we would have about 200,000 missionaries, 4 times what we have now!

Isn't that amazing!

They are becoming a "beacon of the Church..." just as Elder Neal A. Maxwell promised them in the prayer to open Mongolia to missionary work.

Traditional Mongolian Hats

How do we look?

At the Talent Show, these Sisters did a traditional Mongolian Folk Dance.
The tribe is from the north, they are called Reindeer People.
We saw some pictures, of the reindeer, they look just like Santa Clause's,
I think this is where Santa Clause keeps his reindeer during the off season!

We sure do love all of you and miss you!
Merry Christmas and have a Happy New Year!!

Choibalsan, Mongolia - winter

Sunday Dec 20th. We had the Stake President, Ogderal (center on left, with vest), he is the Stake Pres in Ulaanbaatar, Choibalsan is under the Mission direction, but he is also over all the Seminaries and Instutitutes in Mongolia, so he was visiting under that capacity, he is truly an amazing man, a wonderful speaker, our Branch President Erkhembaatar, 3rd one from the bottom on left, leaning way in), the 8 young missionaries, a family whose son just returned from a mission in Mongolia. 15 of us in all, over for dinner. I cooked veg soup, they do have beef here, I'll spare you the details of how they get their meat here, Jody would probably get sick! Cooked a lot of rice and they mixed it all. I think it tasted good and they cleaned up the whole pan! It was fun to have them into our little home, notice the coffee table was the table and they all just sit around it, either on chairs, stools or on the floor, they don't care. They are an amazing people and don't expect a whole lot! It is fun getting to know them, they have been so kind to us! I do have a translator who helps me at Church, she is young and is just learning, but she sits next to me during sacrament meeting. The missionaries help Dad. I think we will need to hire a translator do some of our church assignments.

It is a flat and cold place, and when the wind blow, it is extremely cold! They tell us the Gobe Desert is the coldest place on earth, and we are just north of it! The days are short, sunrise about 8:30 and sets about 4:00, it is almost dark by 4:45. We have been trying to find a thermometer, unsuccessful as yet, so we are going on what the missionaries are telling us, about the cold, 17c (1 degree) to about -25c or -30c! But, it sure doesn't stop the people from being out in it, or the kids from playing on the playgrounds - they just bundle up! We are learning, "the Mongolian wrap", how to tie the scarfs to keep our noses and chins warm. The air is so dry, things don't go moldy, they just dry up, go crunchy and eventually blow away! That is what the snow does, absolutely no moisture in the air or in the snow, it packs down and gets hard and crunchy, but with all the sand it surprisingly is not slick, thank goodness. The Mongolian children are so cute! They are chubby and such cute faces! And with all their layers, look pretty stiff! We love you and think of you often.

Choibalsan, Mongolia

This family invited us to welcome home their missionary, he served in Mongolia. The mother is deaf, but speaks fluent sign language and teaches a class for the members and missionaries in sign language, they are such a pretty people. They serve hot milk and cookies, fruit and are so willing to share, when they have so little to share themselves.

We saw these camels on the way to Choibalsan, they are big things, Mongolian camels have 2 humps, I didn't realize this. Maybe we'll be able take a camel ride in the summer.

Oh, man I hope this works! It has taken so long for us to get connected to the Internet, I'm still not sure if it will work. It took 15 minutes to load these 3 pictures.

But we are doing good - still in culture shock...Choibalsan reminds me of what might be 1920's, everything outdated, but with modern cell phones and some computers. The people are wonderful and so kind. The members are strong, about 75% of them 18 and under. We bore our testimonies and introduced ourselves to them the first Sunday, they were nodding their heads like they understood, and come up to us and start speaking like we should know what they are saying!

We did hear about the visa situation and our Elders are not tracking either. They did question us for a couple of days and kept our passports for a time, but all of that has been resolved and as far as we know we are OK. We leave Wednesday for the city (Ulaanbaatar) for a Mission Conference and Christmas. We will be there for 5 days, we will fly from Choibalsan Airport, about an hour, better than 11 hours!

Thanks for your prayers and updates. I hope to be able to get back into this when I close down and fill you in on more. Love all of you!

BTW, the link to the blog Marla is talking about is in one of my posts from last week.  Here it is again, if any of you want to follow it: http://mikeandmelba.blogspot.com/

Visa news

Okay so I have been reading the blog of Elder and Sister Caldwell. They are in Mongolia right now. They are the ones that posted the picture of Mom and Dad. Their last post says that they had a meeting about the Visa's and it went sour real quick. They said that there was screaming and yelling going on. They have asked the non-native missionaries to not make contact on the streets. It does not sound to good right now. I would hate for mom and dad to come home without getting the chance to touch the lives of the people in Mongolia. Let's keep the situation in our prayers!!

We want ya to know we love ya mom and dad!!! Miss ya lots!!!

Marla

Joshua's Blessing

We just wanted to thank everyone who came to Joshua's baby blessing. It was so special to have the love and support of those who came. It was also very special to have Mom and Dad there before they left to Mongolia. We love you all.

The Queens

I think I was being tested right after Mom and Dad left. It was probably for my own good. I needed to see if I could make it on my own & to learn how to ask for help (the later being hard for me to do). To name a few: My car wouldn't start, the 4-wheeler wouldn't start & I had to drive Dad's truck in the very deep snow. We have gotten allot of snow down here in Payson. Garry came over, started my car and the 4-wheeler (did you know the 4-wheeler has a choke and a pull string, who knew? not me). Garry has the magic touch, the next day neither would start for me, again. I was told Dad had a charger for the 4-wheeler battery, but I could not find it. So Lee Wayne Elmer brought over his charger. And the best news of all... I bought a new car or I should say truck. This time I went for looks, j/k. We are so excited for Friday, Uncle Chris is bringing it up and driving mine back. Yippee!!

Don't worry Dad, the payments are the same.

First Photo of Ovoo and Emaa!

I emailed the parents of a missionary in Choibalsan (I found their blog through a Google search).  They sent this link back to me from a blog by another couple in Ulaanbataar, with a post about Ovoo and Emaa's arrival and subsequent departure to Choibalsan.  I think they look great!  The link also has an aerial view of Choibalsan.  It looks pretty darn flat!  I didn't realize that they were replacing another Elder and Sister Anderson!
http://mikeandmelba.blogspot.com/2009/12/elder-and-sister-anderson.html

Choibalsan Chapel

I found this photo of the chapel in Choibalsan on another missionary's website.  Pretty barren looking behind the beautiful building!

Choibalsan

Yay for a safe arrival in Mongolia!!!  We are all so happy to hear you made it safely.  How wonderful that your months (and months) of training will pay off in your new assignment.  I am sure the fact that you know so much Mongolian already is a huge reason for you being sent to Choibalsan.  We all are excited to hear the details of your trip and the things you are experiencing.  The first couple weeks in the mission field are overwhelming and wonderful at the same time.   If anyone is interested in learning more about Choibalsan, here is a link to some information: http://www.lonelyplanet.com/mongolia/eastern-mongolia/choibalsan

You can see the city on the right side of the blog's map

Good luck, stay warm, and enjoy those dirt roads! (Oh, how it reminds me of Bolivia!)  We love you!

Anderson Boys (and Hailee) Campout Chapter I

Mongolia Mission Address

Today is the big day, and we sure have mixed emotions - it is hard to say goodbye and to know that this time is really is for real! But, we are so grateful to finally be on our way. I was thinking last night that we started this mission process on Jan. 18th! It has been almost a year! We have talked to many couples who have had 3 weeks from their call to being in the field! But, we bhave been so blessed and feel prepared and ready. (I hope!) Love you and pray for each of you every day! May you see the hand of the Lord in your lives, as we have done!
Of course the blog and email will be the best and fastest!
But here are the address and information they gave us:

"The US Postal Service flat rate box is the most economical method of shipping to Mongolia. A package usually takes 2-4 weeks to arrive-longer before Christmas. Insure your packages and get a tracking number. DHL is the fastest and most reliable, but also the most expensive with packages arriving in about a week."
Direct mailing address:
"Missionary's name"
Mongolia Ulaanbattar Mission
Ulaanbaatar 49, P.O. Box 242
Ulaanbaatar, 210649, Mongolia

Mission address:
"Missionary's name"
Mongolia Ulaanbaatar Mission
Bayanzurkh District - 1st Khoroo
LDS Church Building, 4th F;oor
Tokyo Street - 6
Ulaanbaatar, 210649, Mongolia

Pouch mailing:
*this is for letters and postcards only. Letters are to be single sheet, folded into 3 panels, and taped at the top only. Letters sent any other way will be returned to sender
"Missionary's name"
Mongolia Ulaanbaatar Mission
PO Box 30150
Salt Lake City, Utah, 84130-0150

To Contact Mission:
Mission email address is: 2013223@ldschurch.org
Pres. Dallen Andersen

Mongolia Here We Come - Ready Or Not!

Just a quick note to let you know that we received our flight plans today. We fly out on Thursday, Dec 3rd. We are really going! Love all of you and we'll try and keep up with you all. Love you and take care! Love Mom and Dad

Christmas Lights at MTC!

In October, when they were hanging up Christmas lights at the MTC, I told Pres. Cardon, one of the District Presidents, that as pretty as they were going to be we really didn't want to see them turned on...well we did, and sure enough, they are pretty! And it is fun to see them, I don't think Mongolia will have them this pretty! As, you know we received an email from Pres. Andersen that the government has given us permission to come into the country. There are the three couples and we are all excited! We talked to the travel office today, at the MTC, and we will be flying out the last of this week or the first of next!

It was good to see all of you at Thanksgiving and to say good bye one more time! We missed Kevin, Ashlee and Brynlee, we know that Kevin had to work.

A thought from your Dad - "A person soon learns how little he knows when a child begins to ask questions." (so true!)

In D&C 31 the Lord tells missionaries that their families will be in His hands, and He will take care of them. That brings great comfort to us, because we do love each of you and sometimes worry about you! Remember we love you all, and remember to love and take care of each other!

A Thanksgiving Gift To Us!

We finally heard some news! We got an email from our Mission Pres in Mongolia, the government of Mongolia has agreed, even suggested, that the Church bring into the country the three couples who have been waiting for visa's, we are one of them! They will continue to work on them, but will allow us 90 days in the country without a visa. We haven't heard a date, but, Pres Andersen has approval from the Area Presidency to allow us to come... so maybe we'll be in Mongolia for Christmas! Finally things are coming along! (We were scheduled to fly our on Aug 21st).

It was so good to be with the family yesterday for Thanksgiving, and to have Grandma and Grandpa Brady with us! Thanks to everyone for the good cooking and the wonderful company! The jewelry was fun and the boys had a good time hiking and shooting guns!

Congratulations, to Jonah and Jackson for being Student's of the Month at their schools! We are so proud of both of you! Keep up the good work!

How Pumpkin Pies Are Made?

Bring on the pumpkin pie!  We can't wait to see you all!

Happy Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving Guests

Hi Kids, just to let you know that Grandpa and Grandma Brady are coming to Thanksgiving dinner with us! We are excited to see them and all of you! Thanks to all of you for posting and commenting on our Blog. We have enjoyed keeping up with all of you and enjoy reading the comments. Thanks to Marla for having and organizing Thanksgiving Dinner and thanks to Loren and the boys for planning an outing for the Anderson boys! Also, thanks to Tama and Loren for setting up our blog! We did get an email from Pres. Andersen, the talks they had last week were not as productive as they had hoped, so hopefully by Thanksgiving we will have some news. We sure love and appreciate all of you, what a wonderful bunch of people and especially grandchildren! We have so many blessing to count!

Kaitlyn Pallas received her mission call yesterday. It only took 8 days from the time it was sent in! She will be going to the New Jersey, Cherry hill Mission. Kaitlyn will be entering the MTC February 24. Who knows maybe Mom and Dad will be there to greet her :) How Exciting for her!!

Anderson Boys Camping Trip!

The date for the first annual Anderson men's camping trip is almost here.  Nature be warned!  We have calendared this fun trip for the Friday and Saturday between Thanksgiving and little Joshua's blessing.  Of course, we will be going to Zion National Park.  We all love Zion NP and are looking forward to some great hiking, cousin time, games, food, and a big campfire.  Ethan and Jonah are pretty darn excited about camping and spending time with their cousins.   I hope everyone else is as well. 

I say we leave as early as possible on Friday, so we can get there early enough to get in a little hiking.  How about leaving Utah County about 8:00 a.m.?  Of course, we don't need to leave at the same time.  We will stay at the campground right inside the park near the entrance.  Hopefully the campsites will be near each other.  Right now the weather says it should be in the 60s.  It is still a week-and-a-half away, so keep your fingers crossed. 

I will have "Supervan" so I can fit more people.  Anyone was wants to ride with me, you are more than welcome, just let me know.  Everyone bring your own food, tent, bag, cooking supplies, eyc.  I will have a small Whisperlite to cook food and boil water.  Does anyone else have a camping stove?  How about a big water cooler, does anyone have one and will you be willing to bring it?  Garry has volunteered to bring some wood for a campfire.  That night we should play some games and roast marshmallows, etc.  But really we can roll with whatever there is and play it by ear.  If anyone else has some fun ideas please say so. 

I promised Ethan and Jonah we would go out to eat at least one meal while we are camping.  They really want Breakfast food.  What do you all think? On Saturday, I hope to return to Utah and Salt Lake County before it is too late.   Please share with us your ideas.  I hope this is a fun trip for all and maybe we can even turn it into a tradition

Come one come all... We are hosting a feast for ALL!!

Hey family! We just wanted to take a minute and finalize some plans for Thanksgiving. We are open to any suggestions or requests.

Thanksgiving dinner will be at 2:00 p.m.

This is what I have for dinner so far:

Turkey- Garry and Marla
Rolls- Garry and Marla
Sweet Potatoes- Jody
Stuffing and Cranberries- Mom and Dad
Relish Tray- Trisha
Veggie Dip-
Mashed Potatoes- Jenny and Trisha
Gravy- Garry and Marla
Strawberry Pretzel Salad- Tracy and Ryan
Drinks-
Anthiny else you would like to BRING!!-
Paper Products- (Sorry I do not have enough fine china for everyone.LOL)
Pies-Everybody bring one of their favorites


Let me know what you would like to bring if you have not been assigned anything. If there is anything not listed there that you would like let me know and I can make it happen.

Garry and I were thinking that it would be fun for the boys(and those girls)to go skeet shooting in the morning. Around 10:00 am or so....If you have a shot gun, shells, or pigeons bring them with you. Eldon and Garry both have throwers.

If the girls would like we can do something fun too!! (Besides cooking) I have a friend that make jewelry. She will let me use her tools if we would like to make some bracelets. I made some this weekend and they are lots of fun. I am also open for ideas.

Bring with you any games that you may want to play. We will play games after dinner. We have a WII so if you have some games you would like to share with the kids )and adults) bring them too. We have 3 controllers so bring an extra if you can. We will also provide snacks for later that night.

You are all welcome to stay here at long as you would like. We have open beds for anyone that needs a place to stay. Just let me know.

If you have any traditions that you would like to implement please let me know. If I am forgetting to carry on any please let me know.

We are excited to be together. We care about you all so much!!

Love,

Garry and Marla

Loren, are you still planning on going to Zions on Friday? Will you post some info on that? Thanks!!!

We also have Friday and Saturday to be together. Let me know what you would like to do.

Caden the newest Deacon - The Anderson Family has two!

It was good - an unexpected blessing on our part - to see another grandson receive the priesthood! Caden looked so nice in his new suit. He is such a good boy and a wonderful grandson! We are so very proud of him! The Bishop said he as impressed with Caden's readiness and in looking for a scripture Caden found it before he did.

Notice all of these young men with their white shirts and ties, they are preparing to be wonderful missionaries! We are so grateful for good children, you parents, who are teaching our grand children values and the gospel so wonderfully! We also, appreciate the good example you are setting for each other and the help, love and support you give to each other, don't underestimate the power of love and of family!

Dr. and Sister Eliason, they are missionaries waiting with us at the MTC, said they received an email from Pres Andersen, and that the meetings they are having with the lawyers and government are looking hopeful. So...hopefully, maybe...we will hear something this next week!

We were able to get a H1N1 shot, and a shot for the shingles this past week, also. We technically didn't qualify for the H1N1, but because we were missionaries and going out of the country they took us right in...so we are ready!

Thanks for your love and support! We are so truly blessed to have such a wonderful immediate and extended family!

Joshua's Blessing

We wanted to invite everyone to Joshua's baby blessing on Thanksgiving weekend. If you can make it, we'd love to have you.

Date: November 29, 2009
Time: 9:00 a.m.
Place: Kolob 11th Ward Meetinghouse
1627 W. Cadbury Ln.
Springville, UT

Directions from the North:
Take I-15 heading south.
Exit on the second Springville exit (Exit #260)
Turn left onto 3900 S. and cross over the freeway.
Turn right at the first stoplight onto 1750 W.
Turn left onto Cadbury Ln.
The church is two blocks ahead on the right.

Directions from the South:
Take I-15 heading north.

Exit on the first Springville exit (Exit #260)
Turn right onto 3900 S. and head east.
Turn right at the first stoplight onto 1750 W.
Turn left onto Cadbury Ln.
The church is two blocks ahead on the right.

Addendum: Two-footed Jonah

So I think I blogged about Jonah's biking skills a little too early.  Although Jonah is mastering the bike in many ways, yesterday while showing off his newly acquired talent to Grandma Sue, he hit a pile of wet leaves and crashed.  Thankfully, he was wearing his helmet; however, it didn't cover his face.  He hit the pavement with his head, his nose and mouth to be exact.  He now looks like a Simpsons character with a big nose and a large overbite.  Poor little guy; he has been a trooper about it and thankfully the doctor says nothing was broken.  (This poor little guy is so accident prone, eh.)  Needless to say, he is taking a couple of days off from the bike and will be walking instead.  As for the bike, it is in time-out until it can learn to play nicely and listen, which is exactly what we say to Bronwyn Sue when she goes to time-out.

Coyote Truck

Finally the Shawn Anderson family has bought a Truck! Shawn was called to be the Scoutmaster in our Ward a few months ago, so naturally he needs a truck to haul all of the scouts and their equipment around. The boys think that this truck is the best thing ever. Erik always calls it the "Coyote Truck", we are not sure how he came up with the name, but it we love it! We took the boys to a bike jump near our house, we loaded the bikes in the back of the truck. They were exhausted by the time we left. We hope to have many wonderful experiences with our Coyote Truck.

Two-wheeled Jonah

Jonah is an animal. (When asked what kind of animal he is, he replies a dog, a German Shepherd to be exact.) However, Jonah is an animal for another reason. Within only a few days, he has learned how to ride a two-wheeler without training wheels!! Jonah recently expressed interest in riding without training wheels, so this week we have focused on helping him reach that goal. Boise has some great bike paths and we have wanted to ride on them as a family. However, the training wheels on Jonah's bike were so loud and worn down we were hesitant to do so until he could ride without them. Now we have no excuses. He rides like a pro. Way to go Jonah. Persistence and hard work will serve you well little buddy.

Halloween-at Home!

Jackson and Darla, Halloween "Look-a-Likes!"

We have no news about the visa's, except that the Church attorney is working on them. We did receive an email from a couple that in is Mongolia, she said the country is experiencing an extremely bad time with the swine flu, and they have closed a lot of the public businesses and schools, the only things open are the grocery stores...So we are guessing that we will be here for Thanksgiving! That will be OK, we will be able to see all of you, and to see little Joshua blessed. We have made some changes in our daily schedule at the MTC. We have accepted an assignment to help direct the traffic for the young missionaries as they get their immunizations. We are also taking off Friday afternoons, to go to the Temple. That kind of breaks up the week and gives us a little more to do. We came to an awareness this week...

"In the economy of Heaven, nothing , no experience or trial is ever wasted. We all go through things that are intended to strengthen, build and help us. We may not understand or know why, but the Lord does! He knows and asks us to trust and have faith. Someday we may have the privilege of knowing. Someday we may look back and thank Him for the blessings that have come because of those trials. But in the mean time - know the Lord is in charge and He is aware of us!"

We are not the only ones going through "hard times". You all have had or are struggling through things, know that we love each of you! The Lord, also knows and loves you - this we know! We love you, each of you!

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SUNNY CALIFORNIA

We just got back from California. We were there for 5 days and it was nice to get away for a little while. While we were there we hit Seaworld a couple of times, the beach, and Cabrillo Nat'l Monument.  The weather was perfect. Brynlee's favorite part was rolling around in the sand. She had a blast running into the water and then screaming when she saw the bubbles and foam.  Seaworld was fun but I think Brynlee was a little overstimulated. It's a lot for a little kid to take in. Her highlight was probably meeting Elmo and Big Bird. She also liked the flamingos because pink is her favorite. We also saw a statue of a cow wearing a swimsuit and sunglasses and she thought it was 'really cute'. Kevin and I enjoyed watching Brynlee experience new things. It was fun spending time with our little family.  

Petting bat rays at Seaworld. 

Joshua's First Pumpkin

We were very honored this year to have Joshua's first Halloween pumpkin carved by Grandpa Brady. Even though he won't remember it, we will never forget it. Happy Halloween.

Lessons Learned At MTC

Tomorrow, Oct 26th we will be starting our 12th week at the MTC! We are now the longest Senior couple currently at the MTC! There are two more couples, also. We still have no word about visa's, but we did get an email from Pres. Andersen on Thursday that said they were signing some papers on Monday, hoping to open up the visa situation, hopefully...
We have thought a lot about you kids, that went on missions and attended the MTC, walking the halls, learning in the classrooms, eating, playing, holding doors open for the sisters or the senior couples, and saying, "Hi" in the languages you were learning. When we say "Cann Banno" (Hello, how are you?) we get some who will ask where we are going, and some who will do a double take to look at our name badges. We tell them, Mongolia, "That's cool!", they say, and then they are on their way. It's fun to watch, be with and talk to these special young people, who are also making sacrifices to serve the Lord! And we think how blessed we are to have sons, a daughter, son-in-laws, and daughter-in-laws who have walked those halls! And even more special to think we have 11 grandsons who were born of righteous parents, who may also walk those halls, and of course, 4 darling granddaughters who may also!
I want to share one story - We attend the International Branch, #56, on Sunday's. There are aprox. 24 countries represented there, all learning to speak English. Last Sunday, an Elder from Tonga, led the music. He was so fun to watch! He did not keep the beat, he was swaying back and forth, and using both hands to lead us. You could tell he wasn't worrying what the piano player was doing , either. He sang very few of the words, he was probably just learning English and couldn't say the words fast enough. But, he was so fun to watch and that grin! He wasn't just smiling, he was grinning from ear to ear! I couldn't help but smile, too! And, as I looked around many others were smiling, also. It was so fun and inspiring to be in his presence, he was loving just being there! As I was pondering this I thought of a few things...As a missionary, we can jump right in - not worry, and just love the people and what we are doing! Also, even though we may not know the language as good as we would like...WE CAN SMILE IN MONGOLIAN!
One of the blessing of still being at home is to see you kids. We went to the Pumpkin Carving Dinner with some of you and with Grandma and Grandpa Brady. Grandpa carved a pumpkin for Baby Joshua, since he was the only one who brought one! It was small, but it was so cute! He couldn't even attend - doctor's orders to keep him in for a few weeks. We feel so blessed to have such a wonderful heritage! So grateful for righteous parents and grandparents! I ask all of you to keep in touch with Grandma and Grandpa, drop them a note, or call them. I would appreciate it and so would they - they look so good and are blessed to be doing well! Love all of you! take care of yourselves and each other!

The Pumpkinheads

So it is almost the most wonderful time of the year.  No, not Christmas, but Halloween.  The boys love, absolutely love Halloween.  Of course they love the candy, what Anderson doesn't; however, the thing they love the most about this holiday is all the pumpkins.  For weeks they have pled with us to take them to a pumpkin patch.  We finally gave in and went yesterday, swine flu and all.  The boys were in heaven; Bronwyn Sue could care less.  She just liked being out of the house. 

Ethan meticulously searched for the perfect pumpkin.  Jonah was happy with whatever pumpkin that happened to be in his line of sight.  They finally settled on some pumpkins and, as far as squash go, they are nice looking gourds.  Jonah named his pumpkin "J.Killer".  Ethan is still searching for the perfect name.  (Hopefully this won't take him as long as it took to find the pumpkin.)  Ethan says he wants a name that emphasizes "big and round".  I suggested Rosie O'Donnell or "Beached Whale".  He wouldn't even consider them. The boys have been pretty good pumpkin care-takers.  They washed them with warm water, have taken them for a walk, er roll, made soft beds for them and even had a pumpkin picnic.  They have kept pretty busy.  I think I heard the turtles breath a sigh of relief when they discovered something else may grab the boys' attention for a little while. We will see how long the pumpkins handle all the attention before they beg to be made into some pies.